For the Beast
by Anna Molly
Summary: Short reflections about their experiences by each of the boys, several months after rescue. Jack, Samneric, and Ralph done, Roger in progress.
1. Jack's Flashback

A small sigh escaped cracked lips, the only sound echoing in an otherwise silent hallway. China-blue eyes scanned their surroundings; dull, grey, and metal. Jack knelt down slowly, and as he reached for the dropped book, something peculiar occured.  
For just an instant, he was no longer in the dreary schoolhouse. He was back where he belonged, back in charge. Back on his island. He was again dark-skinned and bare-backed, crouching over a slight hoofprint. Mud, sweat, and dried blood stained the intricate mask of clay over his body. Everything was still, silent, and dripping with heat. When he reached for the book, his hand clamped around a worn wooden pole, sharpened at both ends. Flies droned in the background.  
The boy closed his eyes to block out the brilliant sunlight flickering through the dense foliage overhead, and opened them back in the dark hallway. Qiuckly, he stood up and put the book under his arm with the others. A bell rang, but his clouded mind failed to notice. Jack was somewhere else entirely, somewhere more familiar to him than this orderly world had ever been.  
Merridew watched in horror through eyes once his own as blood-stained boys thrust sticks at one of their own, whooping and dancing like animals. The victim cringed and doubled over, shrieking bloody murder, but his cries were not heard over their lusty chanting. Louder and louder and...  
A rough shove on the shoulder startled him so badly that Jack yelled the incantation aloud.  
"Kill the beast! Slit its throat! Spill its blood!"  
He immediately clapped his hand over his mouth, coming face-to-face with a pleasantly surprised Roger. The black haired boy smiled sadistically, and Jack could remember with vivid clarity how furtive that smile had looked only months ago. He shivered with fear and delight.  
"Remembering, eh chief?" he taunted.  
"Quiet, boy. Or we''ll have _your_ head on a stake tonight"  
To anyone not in on the joke, it probably seemed like oddly grotesque but still playful banter. To the boys, though, it struck a primitive chord burned into their minds and the smiles disappeared from their profiles. It wasn't that long since "heads on stakes" was a real threat that, truly, had not seemed at all out of place. Jack sighed again. Would he never be able to just... let it go?

It was odd how some things simply wouldn't go away.


	2. Ralph's Nightmare

Left, right, left, right, left.  
Ralph panted like a dog and leaned forward, urging his feet to keep going. His heart fluttered up in his mouth and streams of sweat trickled through his mop of filthy hair.  
He hissed in pained when creepers scraped up against his exposed flesh, let out a loud sob when his foot tangled in one and twisted painfully in a ninety-degree angle. He could hear them now - his pursuers. They were whooping and ululating, gaining ground impossibly quickly.  
He could hear brush rip and twigs snap as they shot ever closer. It would all end soon, and he knew it. Like Simon and Piggy, he was destined to die here in this paradise. This hell, steaming hot and buzzing like a living creature, would be his grave for eternity. Who would find him? Take him home? Bury him in a churchyard and pray for pity on his poor, lost soul?  
Ralph shook with his tears, coming in great rushes now. It was so hopeless, futile. He was going to die and that was the final word. Jack, not he, would have the last laugh.  
The chanting was so close he could make out the words, familiar and foreign.  
"Kill the pig! Slit its throat! Spill its-"

He jolted upright in a dark, cool room, and it took Ralph several minutes for his mind to process where he was. The boy wiped stale sweat from his face and shivered violently. Another nightmare. That was all. But it had seemed so real. So...  
He sighed. If only they could see him now. All those boys that had followed him so blindly - and the rest of them. Piggy would be ridiculously understanding. Samneric would just nod like they cared. Simon would try to comfort him, and Roger would laugh. Jack...  
He frowned. What would _Jack_ think? With all he'd done, surely that boy was having dreams even worse than his own. With all he'd done, it was a wonder the boy wasn't insane!  
Ralph shook his head. What was he doing? It was late. He should have been sleeping. Should have. But he knew, with the same finality he had 'known' in his dream, that he could not get to sleep again that night. It was as though bloody, painted savages lurked behind every bush. Every time he blinked, red beaches flashed across his eyelids. And in every shadow lurked a hunter, ready to spring. To slit his throat and spill his blood.  
This was not paranoia. This was insanity. This was... was... Oddly, the only word that came to his mind was nostalgia. Ralph quickly dismissed it - his thoughts weren't even pleasant in the slightest. Still, the doctor had said... had said he would forget everything his mind didn't want to remember. Some kind of reverse psychiatry or something. He should have forgotten the chase, the frantic manhunt.  
He should have forgotten the island. But he hadn't.

He missed it.


	3. Samneric's Phobia

"Did you"  
"-hear that?"  
"Yeah."  
Two heads bobbed simultaneously at the question. The boys shivered and looked towards where they supposed the noise had come from. Sam jumped when it sounded again, claws scraping on pavement.  
A dog, German Shepherd most likely, leaped out happily at them from around the fenced street corner. Though it was dirty and covered in mange, its tongue lolled with nothing but canine kindness. Still, they screamed and fell to their knees, sobbing like fools as the creature wagged its tail and joyously slobbered over the faces of fellow beings. With his eyes squeezed shut, Eric kicked out and knocked the dog onto its back. It whimpered slightly, and lay there staring innocently up at them.  
Samneric leaned forward slowly, cautiously. That dog… that animal. They couldn't put their fingers on it, but the creature terrified them out of their mind. Its eyes were so horribly familiar. So like his. The pouncing, spitting, barking... Sam's expression glazed over while he struggled to contain buried memories. Eric opened one eye, almost daring to brave the creature. It returned only a look of the unconditional affection shared by house pets, but he couldn't stand to face the thing down. The boy shut his eyes again and buried his face in his brother's shoulder.  
For God's sake, it was just a little dog. But it was an animal, too. A horrible, mindless animal.  
Samneric cried out. Jack's bloody mantra pounded in their ears, and the choking fear of that inescapable beast rose again in their throats. It was suffocating, and they kicked out at the dog blindly. The pet whined and ran off - away from this strange thing that howled and lashed out without reason. The boys, though, lay there crying on each other. It was a bloody animal! A god-damned bloody monster! Kill the dog, slit its throat, spill its blood!  
It was a living sin. A thoughtless monster.

Just like them.


End file.
